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think the cost of petrol is high now?

There’s been a lot in the news about global warming. We all know what it is, that we’ve contributed to it (guilt, guilt) and that we should really be doing something about it (what, what?).

And aside from the odd list of ways in which we as individuals can contribute, the world as a whole doesn’t seem to be doing anything. It’s not as if Live Earth achieved an awful lot? It was just a chance for a lot of young people to watch a lot of good bands, and occasionally some sheepish celebrity (because it’s not as if many of them are applying these practices themselves) mentioned CFC light bulbs.

But this should bring the point home... Despite the warnings of climate change, and the past four years of high oil prices, a new report by the International Energy Agency based in Paris predicts that the world oil demand will rise faster than expected, threatening a supply crisis.

Oil will rise by an average of 2.2% a year from this year to 2012, up from 2%, and the share of world oil consumption will rise to 46% of global demand by 2012 from 42%.

Translated that means: the world “needs more than three million barrels per day of new oil each year to offset the falling production in the mature fields outside of OPEC,” Lawrence Eagles, head of oil markets analysis at the energy agency, said.

As we’ve become blasé about the higher prices of petrol, we’ve simply returned to our former levels of high consumption(spend, spend, spend). The growth of petrochemicals industries and low-cost airlines are also increasing demand.

And before you jump up and proclaim ‘biofuels – simply implement them and we can continue as before’, they’re only set to account for about 2% of the global energy supply by 2012, so that puts paid to that theory. [NY times]

What this news does beg is a complete change in ethics, spending habits and ways of living, which only a small group of people world-wide are putting into practice. It begs of governments, business and individuals to reflect on each of our contributions to the demise of the planet as we know it.